The Headsman eBook

Chapter III.

Ha, cousin Silence, that thou hadst seen
That, that this knight and I have seen!

King Henry IV.

The calculating patron of the Winkelried had patiently
watched the progress of the foregoing scene with great
inward satisfaction, but now that the strangers seemed
to be assured of support powerful as that of Melchior
de Willading, he was disposed to turn it to account
without farther delay. The old men were still
standing with their hands grasping each other, after
another warm and still closer embrace, and with tears
rolling down the furrowed face of each, when Baptiste
advanced to put in his raven-like remonstrance.

“Noble gentlemen,” he said, “if
the felicitations of one humble as I can add to the
pleasure of this happy meeting, I beg you to accept
them; but the wind has no heart for friendships nor
any thought for the gains or losses of us watermen.
I feel it my duty, as patron of the bark, to recall
to your honors that many poor travellers, far from
their homes and pining families, are waiting our leisure,
not to speak of foot-sore pilgrims and other worthy
adventurers, who are impatient in their hearts, though
respect for their superiors keeps them tongue-tied,
while we are losing the best of the breeze.”

“By San Francesco! the varlet is right;”
said the Genoese, hurriedly erasing the marks of his
recent weakness from his cheeks. “We are
forgetful of all these worthy people while joy at our
meeting is so strong, and it is time that we thought
of others. Canst thou aid me in dispensing with
the city’s signatures?”

The Baron de Willading paused; for well-disposed at
first to assist any gentlemen who found themselves
in an unpleasant embarrassment, it will be readily
imagined that the case lost none of its interest, when
he found that his oldest and most tried friend was
the party in want of his influence. Still it
was much easier to admit the force of this new and
unexpected appeal than to devise the means of success.
The officer was, to use a phrase which most men seem
to think supplies a substitute for reason and principle,
too openly committed to render it probable he would
easily yield. It was necessary, however, to make
the trial, and the baron, therefore, addressed the
keeper of the water-gate more urgently than he had
yet done in behalf of the strangers.

“It is beyond my functions; there is not one
of our Syndics whom I would more gladly oblige than
yourself, noble baron,” answered the officer;
“but the duty of the watchman is to adhere strictly
to the commands of those who have placed him at his
post.”

“Gaetano, we are not the men to complain of
this! We have stood together too long in the
same trench, and have too often slept soundly, in
situations where failure in this doctrine might have
cost us our lives, to quarrel with the honest Genevese
for his watchfulness. To be frank, ’twere
little use to tamper with the fidelity of a Swiss or
with that of his ally.”